As Congress Stalls, Air Traffic Creeps Toward Gridlock

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As Congress Stalls, Air Traffic Creeps Toward Gridlock

Congress still hasn't agreed on how to fund the Federal Aviation Administration, which means the agency will keep muddling through on a shoestring budget that keeps the lights on but does nothing to prevent the air traffic meltdown everyone knows is coming.

There's little chance Congress will approve a reauthorization package before the stop-gap measure that's been paying the bills expires in March. The reauthorization lays out a blueprint for meeting the air transportation system's needs and creates the mechanism to pay for it. Another six-month extension would cover the FAA's operating expenses, but it wouldn't finance the improvements that must be made. Topping the list is the NextGen air traffic control network that will replace a system built on World War II technology. Getting the $20 billion system in place is imperative. Without it, the FAA says the nation's air traffic control system will be effectively gridlocked by 2015.

If you feel like you've heard this all before, you have. The current authorization expired at the end of 2007, and everyone's been bickering over the reauthorization ever since. All the while, we've been moving ever closer to the day when the system is overwhelmed.

In 2007, then-FAA administrator Marion Blakely proposed a "hybrid funding structure" she said would generate revenue based on the costs users impose on the air traffic system. Everyone, from commercial airlines to weekend pilots, would pay a share. It called for eliminating the domestic passenger ticket tax and cutting international arrival and departure taxes. The cuts would be offset by congestion charges, increasing the passenger facility charge (PFC), and new taxes on general aviation and corporate jets.

Everyone hated the idea.

The Air Transport Association, which represents the big airlines, went apocalyptic, saying that the proposed increase in the PFC bump would require a family of four to pay a total of $112 in facility charges. The association found that unacceptable.

The Experimental Aircraft Association opposed the proposal to tack a $25 user fee onto every general aviation flight, arguing it would penalize everyone from pilots and mechanics to kids saving their allowance for flying lessons.

And the air traffic controllers pushed for pay raises, claiming that salaries were so paltry that experienced employees were retiring early. That, they argued, was creating a potentially dangerous shortage of people who keep the system running.

With everyone bickering, nothing got done and everyone pointed fingers. It's against this backdrop that Congress has been trying to hammer out a reauthorization bill. It seemed like a deal was at hand last summer when the House passed a bill and the Senate was poised to follow until partisan politicking doomed the effort.

There hasn't been much progress since, so it seems the current extension will run out before a reauthorization bill is passed. That's bad news for an agency with a long list of things that must be done to modernize our aviation infrastructure, which is expected to serve 1 billion people and 15 million flights a year by 2015. NextGen will replace an air traffic control system that uses radar with a network based on GPS and advanced avionics. The system will allow more efficient tracking of aircraft, increasing efficiency and easing congestion. It is but one item on a to-do list that includes building more runways and repairing decrepit air traffic control towers.

"Ultimately, the longer it takes to get a final bill, the longer it will take to upgrade our system," Rep. Jerry Costello, chairman of the House Aviation Subcommittee, said in an op-ed piece inThe Hill.

And anyone that's flown lately knows that the system needs to be upgraded ASAP.